Robin Skone Palmer

Kitty Cat Yoga

Yeah, I’ve tried yoga. Some of us are built for it — some are not. I’m not. However, I’m constantly reminded that I need to do some kind of exercise. And who reminds me (other than the mirror, I mean) — it’s my very own house-mates.

Smokey has been doing it for so long that now she does yoga in her sleep. Even now that she is an “elderly” cat (according to her vet), she is still plenty limber. I am amazed at the agility with which she runs, leaps and even sleeps. Sleeping seems to be her favorite thing and she’s so cute that I have hundreds of pictures of her sleeping. Yoga obviously is second nature to her.

Trying, but I still can’t get my toes clear up to my noes.

Then there’s Paddy O’Cat. He tries — he really does — but on him it doesn’t look so natural and it’s pretty obvious that there’s something that prevents him from actually managing to get his toes all the way up to his ears. (Could it be that gut around his middle?) I think he’s pretty ambivalent about it — he knows he should be doing something and it looks so easy when Smokey does it — but he has never quite mastered the “circular cat” pose. The closest he’s come is the “nibbled doughnut.”

Yoga seems to come naturally to cats: they s-t-r-e-t-c-h (front paws way out, front low to the ground, raise your back end, reach your nose toward your knees — now doesn’t that feel good?) — they roll over on their backs and put their paws above their head with back legs splayed (“the starfish”) and have no problem whatsoever raising their back leg way over their head as they groom their nether regions (“the cello”).

I envy the ease with which they do all this. I’m in trouble if I don’t hold on to the counter when I lean down to pick up a dropped utensil. One of those clever lists that goes around from time-to-time mentioned something like, “you know you’re past middle age when you stoop down to pick up something and think to yourself, ‘what else can I do while I’m down here?'” It’s true! Dang — when did middle age pass me by?

Yoga-Schmoga. The best exercise is lie down in the shade of a big old tree and take deep breaths until you fall asleep. Really — you think these feet can get past this belly? No way! And really, why would they want to?

When my friend Jean was visiting a couple of years back, we got Groupons for “unlimited yoga for a month.” She loved it! We went faithfully for the week she was here. The day she left, I rolled up my yoga mat and tossed it in the back of the closet where it’s stayed ever since, hopefully disintegrating into something I’ll never be able to use again.

Of course there are many other kinds of exercise besides yoga — there’s the basic walking which I love to do when the temperature is less than 100, there’s always the Y which has not only exercise machines, but a swimming pool, there’s Curves that I used to do with a group of ladies. Yeah, lotsa choices, but looking at my cats, I think I align myself most with Lop Ear.

I don’t suppose opening the refrigerator door could be considered exercise. Could it?